Mouse Training London Ltd: Microsoft Access Reports

Friday, 11 January 2019

Microsoft Access Reports – Grouping Reports

Grouping Reports

Grouped reports will present data in sections rather than all together. They can be designed manually but it is a lot easier by using the wizard and then making adjustments as necessary.

1. Start the report wizard.

2. Choose the table and select fields. (Consideration needs to be given as to how the report is laid out when choosing how many fields are to be added.)

On the next screen it asks about grouping. This is where a decision needs to made as to how the data needs to be grouped. This will vary depending on what the report is about – it could be

Customers by Country
Employees by Department
Sales by Salesman
Invoices by Month
Invoices by Salesman by Month

The data might need to be brought together from different sources first!

3. Select the field to be grouped by and then click on the arrow to move it to the right Four levels of grouping can be added when setting up the report in the wizard.

When a field has been added then the grouping options can be set. If nothing is done in the grouping options then each unique value will form a group, but here the values can be set differently. The options available will vary depending on the data type of the field to be grouped by.

4. Select the grouping options and Click on next.

5. This allows you to choose the sort order of the report. Unless the first column is how you want to sort by do not choose the sort order here. The sort fields chosen here set the order in which they appear on the report.

6. Decisions need to be made as to how the report is to be laid out

Whether Stepped, Block or Outline is chosen will depend on how many fields were chosen to go in the report earlier.

Should the paper be laid out portrait or landscape? Should the field width be adjusted so that all the fields will fit on a page? Both of these depend on the number of fields chosen for the report.